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Welsh, Amy

Program Coordinator and Professor of Wildlife & Fisheries Resources

A winding path brought me to the field of conservation genetics and I have always enjoyed the journey. I grew up in Baltimore, MD and received my B.S. degree in Zoology and Psychology from the University of Maryland-College Park (1996). I then worked at Walter Reed Army Institute of Research looking at the effects of sleep deprivation on performance (1996-1999). I received my Masters of Forensic Science degree from The George Washington University (1999) and then worked at the Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory (1999-2001), where I was introduced to genetics and its important applications. Ecology and zoology remained an important passion and I moved out west to pursue my Ph.D. in Ecology at UC-Davis (2006). The focus of my dissertation was the population genetics of lake sturgeon. I then moved to the shore of Lake Ontario and was an assistant professor at SUNY-Oswego (2006-2011). The journey has now brought me to wild and wonderful West Virginia, where I continue research on the genetics of fish and wildlife populations.

Publications

  1. Whitaker, J.M., Price, L.E., Boase, J., Bernatchez, L., and Welsh, A.B. (2020) Detecting fine-scale population structure in the age of genomics: a case study of lake sturgeon in the Great Lakes. Fisheries Research 230: 105646.
  2. Welsh, A., Carlson, D., Schlueter, S., and Jackson, J.R. (2020) Tracking stocking success in a long-lived species through genetics and demographics: evidence of natural reproduction in Lake Sturgeon after twenty-two years. Transactions of the American Fisheries Society 149: 121-130.
  3. Gibson, I., Welsh, A.B., Welsh, S.A., and Cincotta, D.A. (2019) Genetic swamping and possible species collapse: tracking introgression between the native Candy Darter and introduced Variegate Darter. Conservation Genetics 20: 287-298.
  4. Welsh, A.B., Schumacher, L., and Quinlan, H. (2019) A reintroduced lake sturgeon population comes of age: a genetic evaluation of stocking success in the St. Louis River. Journal of Applied Ichthyology 35(1): 149-159.
  5. Nathan, L., Welsh, A., and Vokoun, J. (2019) Watershed-level brook trout genetic structuring: evaluation and application of riverscape genetics models. Freshwater Biology 64(3): 405-420.
  6. Johnson, A., Zipfel, K., Hallerman, E., Massure, W., Euclide, P., and Welsh, A . (2023) Genomic evaluation of native Walleye in the Appalachian region and the effects of stocking. Transactions of the American Fisheries Society 152: 346-360.
  7. Akers, M., Quinlan, H., Johnson, A., Baker, E., and Welsh, A. (2023) Parentage analysis reveals unequal family sizes during hatchery production. Fishes 8: 140.
  8. Millikin, A.R., Coster, S.S., Welsh, A.B., and Anderson, J.T. (2023) Pool age and local habitat are associated with effective number of breeders in spotted salamander populations colonizing created vernal pools. Diversity 15: 124.
  9. Rounsville, Jr., T.F., Rogers, R.E., Welsh, A.B., Ryan, C.W., and Anderson, J.T. (2022) Novel hair snare and genetic methods for non-invasive bobcat detection. Ecology and Evolution 12: e8435.
  10. Hassler, K.N., Kessinger, B.E., Harms, C.E., Price, L.E., Barton, E.P., Oxenrider, K.J., Rogers, R.E., Pearce, K.J., Serfass, T.L., and Welsh, A.B. (2021) Genetic confirmation of predation of an adult female eastern spotted skunk by a barred owl. Southeastern Naturalist 20: 110-118.
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